Monday, November 07, 2016

New Delhi/Mumbai: Poor visibility due to intense smog has thrown flight and rail schedules out of gear. Flights in and out of Delhi, especially early morning, have been delayed by 30 to 45 minutes. Some incoming flights had to be diverted to neighbouring Lucknow and Jaipur. On Saturday, almost 25 Delhibound trains were reported to be running late by half an hour to two hours due to smog.
The situation on Sunday was expected to be the same. Such visibility conditions are typical in Delhi later in the winter. “The fog season hasn’t even started yet and we are experiencing problematic visibility conditions,” said a spokesman at Air India. Two of the airline’s flights were diverted to Jaipur on Sunday. Its early morning flight to Amritsar has been delayed every day since Thursday, he added. Go Air had to delay its flights. An early flight from Mumbai on Sunday had to be diverted to Lucknow.
Spokespersons and executives at Indi-Go and Vistara said there haven’t been any major disruptions yet. Delhi airport has activated CAT I and II, operational procedures implemented in low visibility conditions, an executive said.
07/11/16 Economic Times